As this year’s Oscar nominations are revealed, you may be upset to see that your personal favourite has been missed of the list. But...

As this year’s Oscar nominations are revealed, you may be upset to see that your personal favourite has been missed of the list. But while the awards are spread, rightly, wider and wider, it still leaves a lot of movies out in the cold, and it always has. So we’d like to shine some praise upon these movies that sadly got snubbed by the academy.

The Terminator

As praised by critics as the 1984 Sci-Fi was, it was totally ignored by the academy in both 1984 / 1985 in favour of more famous dramas at the time; see Terms of Endearment & Amadeus. It wasn’t until T2: Judgement Day that the franchise got some awards love.

The Big Lebowski

What is now a cult classic did somewhat poorly at the box office in 1998 and as a result somehow split between the nets while Oscar voting was taking place. With Shakespeare in Love & Saving Private Ryan both being released at the same time, this Cohen Bros classic was sadly forgotten about.

The Shawshank Redemption

Now considered one of the greatest films of all time, it was originally a box office disappointment, earning only $16 million during its initial theatrical run. Up against tough competition from Pulp Fiction & Forrest Gump plus a general lack of interest in prison movies made this fail to win any awards from the Academy, though it was nominated for 7.

Fight Club

Perhaps deemed too extreme at the time, or perhaps the somewhat confusing plot made this now dubbed classic overlooked by the Academy back in the 2000. The big winner that year, another psychological case study; American Beauty.

Drive

Only nominated for Best Sound Editing, this Ryan Gosling classic was ignored for everything else back in 2012. Perhaps it was the large sections without dialogue or the ‘hyper-cool’ violence used throughout that made Drive tainted for Academy support. Regardless it still manged to find its audience and complete with a cult soundtrack still plays in many people’s homes today.

Heat

With a pair of legendary leading men never before seen on screen together, a December release date in the thick of awards season and a modern crimescape narrative, Michael Mann’s Heat probably should have been up for a slew of Oscars. Somehow, that didn’t happen. Back in 1996 it seemed the Academy has more support for Batman Forever, which earned 3 nominations.

Leon

Though featuring great performances from both Jean Reno & Natalie Portman. This 1994 French thriller got massively overlooked at the Oscars. However it did find great success at the French equivalent ceremony, the Cesar Award. Certainly worth a re-watch, especially for a young Gary Oldman as the sinister Norman Stansfield.

Psycho

A now classic, but at the time overlooked greatly by many organisations and critics alike. Reports of crowds queuing round the block were recorded but as the 1962 Oscars rolled round the much safer West Side Story cleared up.

Stand By Me

Arguably a the inspiration for Stranger Things and the It movies, Stand By Me also launched the careers of Wil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman & Kiefer Sutherland. However at the time of release back in 1986 the much grittier Platoon & The Color of Money won the top prizes at that year’s Oscars.

Citizen Kane

While a critical success, Citizen Kane failed to recoup its costs at the box office. It was however nominated for 9 Academy Awards and was widely believed to win most of them. However it only received the award for Best Writing. It was reported in the media at the time that block voting by screen extras deprived Citizen Kane of Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Actor.

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